Against the Odds
by CharlotteBlackwood
Summary: Sanna Scott has broken up with her boyfriend and is looking toward the future, but what future can there be with a war on the horizon? Can she build something, or will it all crumble around her? FP/OC, GP/OC, LE/JP, mentions of RL/OC. This will have a sequel. M for sexual content
1. Beginnings and Endings

**A/N: This is a two-part story dedicated to **_**Forever Siriusly Sirius**_**, who asked for my next Sirius/OC to be a happy ending. All right, so this isn't a Sirius/OC you're saying. I told you, there's a sequel. Who ends up with Sirius? You'll have to wait and see! This first part is going to be nearly sixty chapters, so I hope you're down for the ride!**

** -C**

Lily was watching Sanna Scott as the blonde entered the room, sitting down on her bed and trying not to look too morose.

"I've been dying to ask you all break, but I didn't want to put it in a letter," Lily said, her green eyes dull and sad. "Why did you do it?"

"You know why," Sanna sighed. "I wasn't in love with him anymore."

Sanna had broken up with her boyfriend of a year, Remus Lupin, over Christmas holiday, and everyone they mutually knew was buzzing with the news.

"I guess that makes sense," Lily said slowly, frowning. "I wish…."

"Lily, there was no way we could stay together. I couldn't deceive him. He deserves to be happy, but so do I. We would only have come to resent each other eventually, and I value him as a friend."

Even if she hadn't valued Remus as a friend, Sanna would have done everything to keep things from being awkward with him, because he was close friends with her best friend, Sirius Black.

"I get that," Lily finally said, sighing and picking up her book once more. "Did you see Anissa and Marlene on your way up?"

"I didn't," Sanna said casually, glancing down at her skirt to see what it was that was tickling her leg. She had a loose string that she carefully pulled out of the skirt. Lily was wrinkling her nose. Lily was one of those people too paranoid about running her hem or unraveling her clothing to pull at a string, and she was also one of those people who had to try very hard not to impose her own beliefs about everything on the people around her. Sanna was a tolerant sort of person, which was why she and Lily got on so well, but she could understand why Sirius could hardly stand the girl.

"I'm back!" Marlene cried, rushing into the dormitory with Mary MacDonald at her heels. "Did you miss me?"

"We were in perpetual sorrow without you, darling," Sanna drawled, not looking up from her skirt.

Marlene tossed a comb at Sanna's head. If it had been anyone else, Sanna would have asked why they had a comb on hand to throw, but Marlene was an oddity. It was part of what Sanna loved about her.

"I heard a certain someone broke up with a certain someone over holiday," Marlene teased, flopping onto her own bed, across the room from Sanna.

Sanna just shrugged.

"It had to be done," she said simply.

Marlene rolled her eyes.

"We know it had to be done," Mary said softly, taking off her shoes. "But did it really have to be done on Boxing Day?"

Marlene broke out in a peal of giggles and Sanna rolled her eyes, glaring at her sandy-haired friends.

"Did either of you see Anissa on your way up?" Lily asked, shifting the topic rapidly and forcefully.

"No," they chorused. They erupted in giggles once more. Sanna rolled her eyes all over again and got to her feet, marching into the bathroom, glancing at her face to decide if she really needed to wash it before bed. Of course, she did, but she hated doing it. She splashed a bit of water on her face and squirted a bit of cleanser onto her fingertips before massaging it over her face.

Sanna had a clear, pallid complexion. She, like Lily, looked a bit like porcelain in the right light, and she would like to keep it that way. She didn't spend too much time in the sun. She took especial care of her skin every morning and night.

When her face was sufficiently cleaned, she rinsed it thoroughly, making sure she felt no residue of cleanser still on her face before patting it dry.

Lily came in a moment later as Sanna was rubbing moisturizer on her face.

"Are you sure you're all right?" Lily asked softly.

"I'm over it, Lily. For one thing, it happened over a week ago. For another, I made up my mind more than a month ago. If you want to know if Remus is all right, that makes more sense. You'd have to ask him. He hasn't spoken to me since."

That was the thing that stung the most. They had seen each other during the New Year's party Sirius threw, but she did not force him to speak to her. She knew his pain was still very raw and it wouldn't be fair of her to make him move through his emotions faster than he was ready for.

"I guess I probably should," Lily said slowly. "Did you cut your hair?"

"Trimmed it," Sanna said, putting toothpaste on her toothbrush. "The ends were getting scraggly."

She brushed her teeth vigorously, wondering if Lily would leave. For a long time they just stood there in the strange not-quite silence of the bathroom, the sounds of tooth-brushing echoing on the tiled walls.

Finally, Lily patted Sanna's shoulder before walking back out into the dormitory.

Sanna spat and rinsed both her mouth and her toothbrush before picking up her comb and carefully combing out her blonde locks.

When she was a child, she'd loved her hair. It made her think of her mother, who had the same hair before she died. That had been years ago, and the hair no longer held such positive associations, but rather had attracted all the idiotic boys who thought she had to be a certain way because she was blonde. Sanna didn't know where all the associations came from, but she didn't think she was so different from Lily or Anissa, and they were red-haired and black-haired.

"Fuck!" Sanna heard Marlene squeal. Anissa had arrived. The blonde waited for a moment for her closest female friend to enter the bathroom.

Anissa was a very pale girl, with shining black hair and pale blue eyes. She looked like a person possessed when she was excited about something, but now and as usual she looked incredibly tired. She came from a very large family, and although she was the youngest, this meant she had a great deal of responsibility.

"How did he take it?" Anissa asked, taking a couple of cotton swabs out of a little box in her corner of the counter space. She wore eye makeup every day, to try to balance the strangeness of her eye color with her very dark hair.

"I suppose as well as can be expected," Sanna said with a shrug. "I've not spoken to him since. I think…"

"Relax, Sanna, I talked to him on the train," Anissa said. "He told me he's still in love with you, and he's absolutely desolate, but I think he'll get used to the idea, given time."

Sanna did not have her friend's optimism.

"Desolate?"

"Oh, Sanna, think of how in love with you the poor boy was. Is. And you were his first girlfriend and everything."

"He was my first boyfriend."

"Different," Anissa said, shaking her finger.

Anissa didn't know about Remus's condition, but she knew about his issues of self-esteem. She knew that Remus did not feel worthy to date anyone, much less Sanna. They had gotten together because she kissed him while they were studying and somehow it got heated very quickly and she wouldn't take no for an answer when she suggested that they go on a date. Once he went on one date with her, he couldn't deny himself so easily.

Remus had been a good boyfriend, and Sanna really did feel very bad at hurting him, but it would have been worse to stay with him when she knew she no longer loved him. At least, that's what she and Sirius had both agreed just before December, when she consulted her best friend on the situation. Sirius had warned her that Remus would be shattered, but Sanna had hoped it was an exaggeration.

She should have known better.

"Other than breaking hearts, how was your Christmas?" Anissa said teasingly.

"It was fine," Sanna said with a shrug. "You know how Olivia can be when she doesn't get her way, but otherwise we were all pretty happy with our gifts, and I think even she wasn't exactly unhappy with what she did get."

"What did they not get her this time?"

"A new broom," Sanna said, and both girls rolled their eyes.

All four of the Scott sisters played Quidditch. Sanna and her elder sisters Grace and Veronika were in Gryffindor and played under James Potter, one of Sanna's classmates. Olivia, the youngest, was a Ravenclaw and took it very personally that their parents did nothing to give her an edge over her sisters.

"Lovely," Anissa said darkly. "Well, you can imagine how my break was."

Sanna nodded, frowning as she turned to face her friend.

Anissa was the youngest of eight children, and one of her older brothers – her favorite, actually – had been killed by Death Eaters two days after Halloween. Christmas holiday had been her first time going home since the funeral, and Sanna knew that it would be hard for Anissa, having Christmas without William. All the girls knew it, especially Sanna and Lily, and Lily had been eagerly awaiting a chance to make sure Anissa was okay.

"Lily?"

"She accosted me, yes," Anissa said, smirking a little and picking up a washcloth to begin cleaning off her luxuriously colorful lipstick. "You know Lily. Although I think she expects me to be worse than I am."

Lily expected nothing of the sort, Sanna knew. Anissa was pretending she was better than she was, but they all knew she was a wreck inside. It was so bad that Professor Dumbledore was having her to his office every other week on Tuesdays to discuss her mental health and grieving.

"Anyway," Anissa said, rinsing the lipstick off the cloth as best she could, "have you talked to Sirius since the breakup?"

Half the school seemed to think that now Sanna had broken up with Remus, she and Sirius were finally going to have the wild romp everyone thought they'd been on the verge of for years. Sanna rolled her eyes. Anissa hadn't meant it that way, except jokingly, but it was sad that the rumors were still the first thing to come to mind.

"He sat with me on the train," Sanna said. "He doesn't like how it turned out, but he's supporting me. He's supporting us both."

"As he should," Anissa muttered, pulling a couple of cotton swabs out of a little box and dousing them with remover before carefully wiping away the thin black line around her eyes. "He'd be a terrible friend for abandoning either of you. I think he needs to be careful, though."

"How so?"

"Well, it's Remus who really needs support right now, and if he's seen giving too much time to you, he's going to be seen as not only taking sides, but perhaps, taking some on the side."

Sanna rolled her eyes, flicked the back of Anissa's head as she passed, and went back out into the bedroom.

Anissa was right, though. She and Sirius had a delicate line to walk in their friendship now, but she had no doubts that things would come out right, in the end. They usually did, even if the way to the end was painful and remarkably uphill. She climbed into bed, closed her eyes, and tried to shut out the world as she drifted off to sleep. Of course, her dreams were still riddled with guilt from how she ended things with Remus, but that would pass.

The following morning, Sanna sat comfortably at breakfast, trying not to convey annoyance when Sirius sat down beside her.

"How is he?" she asked a bit stiffly, not looking up from her plate as she carefully buttered her toast.

"Bad," Sirius muttered, leaning across her to get a plate of sausages. "But I think the best way to make him better is to force him to get over it."

Sanna nearly dropped her toast. Sirius trying to prescribe such things was a surefire way to disaster. But when James sat across from them a moment later, she realized that this was something James must have come up with. She raised her eyebrows.

"Are you to completely stupid?" she asked as calmly as possible, and James just blinked at her owlishly.

She didn't get an answer from them, although she didn't feel she needed one. Moments later, they were joined by Gideon, Fabian, Peter, and Remus.

"Hello, boys," Sanna said, training her eyes back down at her plate. She felt Anissa sitting beside her.

"Oh, wow, solidarity, is it?" Anissa said, the bad joke dripping off her lips. "You know, William died months ago, guys. I really am fine."

Fabian gave a half-hearted laugh for Anissa's benefit, but no one was amused. It all hit a bit too close to the truth.

"Good morning, ladies," Gideon said softly, glancing quickly at Remus. Sanna braved a look to find him staring at her with a mix of pain and longing. She quickly looked down again.

The worst part about not loving Remus anymore was knowing that he was still so much in love with her.

"Sanna?"

Olivia's breathy, self-impressed voice wafted over the heads of the boys to Sanna. She looked up again at her sister, who was looking very frazzled.

"Yes, dear?" Sanna asked, feeling Sirius's hand on her knee to keep her from saying something vicious. Sanna had a thin veneer of patience when it came to her youngest sister, but that patience was always its thinnest on returning from holidays.

"I need to borrow your gloves for practice."

Before Sanna had a chance to say anything, James snorted very loudly and said, "Well, that would be rather stupid, wouldn't it?"

"Oh?" Olivia said, smirking. "Pray tell, Potter, why?"

"Well first off," James said, turning to grin at her, "a Chaser using Seeker's gloves would be idiocy. The grip is all different. You'd diminish your hold on the Quaffle." Olivia just continued to smirk passively at him. "Secondly, and perhaps most importantly, why would anyone on my team loan something to a Ravenclaw? I mean, it would hurt your practice, so I might give her the okay anyway, but this is quite daft of you, Scott. I expected better."

It got confusing sometimes, at practices. Sanna and her other two sisters, Grace and Veronika, were all on the Gryffindor team, and James had a habit of barking out orders by surname during practice. "SCOTT!" was a common part of his practice vocabulary, and it led to all sorts of confusion.

"You see, Potter, that's where you're wrong," Olivia chirped happily, and Sirius gripped Sanna's need a little tighter. He knew well enough what was sure to be coming. "You see, I want to make it harder for myself in practice, so that I'm that much better with my normal gloves. And for another, it really wouldn't matter if you brought out all the troops to try to sabotage our practice this year. We've gone young blood. You're just tired, all of you, and with Grace's wrist, you're not going to win this year."

Olivia floated away before James or Sanna or either of the Prewetts had a chance to properly say anything, although all four had jumped to their feet. They were all on the team together, and took such slights very personally.

"Sit down and stop being idiots," Sirius said sternly. "All of you. She only came over here to get a rise and you know it. Don't let her stir you up. You know as well as I do that the fresh blood she's talking about is more like fresh meat. Macalister couldn't hit a still target with a Bludger if he had all day to try."

The boys sat down, but Sanna kept standing, watching her sister swagger back to the Ravenclaw table. She did love Olivia, in a strange, sisterly way, but there was no real affection between them. It wasn't like the closeness Sanna had with both Grace and Veronika. Sirius grabbed Sanna's hand and pulled her back onto the bench. She yelped with pain as she hit the wood hard.

"Sorry," he said, wincing with her. "But you were starting to cause a scene, you know. She's not worth it, bug."

She glanced across at Remus, who was studiously picking at his potatoes. Remus had always hated that Sirius had nicknames for Sanna, no matter how many times she tried to explain that it was just because they were so close. She liked some of them. Bug was an ambivalent one, but it wasn't the worst of the things he called her. She bit her lip and looked down at her plate, suddenly not very hungry. She had the urge to get up and go to the library before class, but her sister would take it as a victory, and Sanna couldn't have that.

"My nerves are a bit tightly wound, I suppose," she said, picking up her goblet of pumpkin juice. "All winter with Olivia in that house…."

"She's a bit of a piece of work, isn't she?" Gideon asked with a frown.

"You have no idea," Anissa said, snorting. Sanna listened and avoided looking at anyone as she ate her breakfast. Anissa spent the rest of the meal relating tales of Olivia's obnoxious, self-centered behavior, entertaining them all and keeping the tension between Sanna and Remus from taking over their part of the table.

But all the while it hung there between them, just waiting to be acknowledged.


	2. Sifting

Sanna finally agreed to sit down with Remus not quite a month later, and they met in the library. You couldn't have an argument in the library. Not really. And it held so many happy memories for them as friends and as a couple that it did seem like the only right place to meet up and settle their awkwardness, for the sake of all their many mutual friends.

"I'm sorry I dropped the bomb on Boxing Day like that," she said honestly. "I don't know what I was thinking. People told me it was a bad idea, and I…."

She didn't quite know how to explain it to Remus, because she didn't know how to explain it to herself. She just wasn't in love with him anymore. It was that simple, wasn't it? Except she'd said that already and it still felt as though there was so much more to say.

"I know you don't love me," Remus said. If she hadn't known better, she would have thought he'd read her mind. "And I can't pretend I'm not hurt and surprised, but I don't want you to be unhappy, Sanna. It's the last thing I've ever wanted."

His amber eyes were so full of love that for a moment she almost felt she could love him again. But as soon as he blinked it was gone.

"I couldn't stay with you, Remus," she said softly. "But I really didn't want to hurt you."

He smiled a little bitterly, and it looked wrong on his face. It hardened features that were usually so soft with tiredness.

"It was always going to hurt, Sanna, no matter how you did it. It's better you did it now than later, but…. Well, I don't know that a week sooner or later would have really made a difference."

Sanna hoped that this was true, wanted it to be true so badly, but she couldn't really convince herself, even though she heard it from his own mouth. Perhaps especially because she'd heard it from his mouth. She knew he was still very hurt, and what sort of things might he say to placate her? The possibilities seemed endless.

"So how do we move forward?" she asked, trying not to let the awkwardness overtake them again, even though their true feelings were hiding just beneath the surface of the lies they told each other and themselves.

Remus tilted his head a little and said, "As friends, I suppose. We were friends for years before. I don't see why we shouldn't be friends again."

But Sanna could see, she could see it in her mind's eye, the way his eyes burned in the dim light of her bedroom when her parents went out for shopping, forgetting that Remus was over. She could hear it echoing in her ears in the way that his voice had apologized over and over for the bleeding their first time together. She could feel it on her skin in the way he touched her with the reverence of a man worshiping some god in desperation for his very soul.

The fact that she no longer loved him did not mar her memory of these events, nor the way she cherished them. She would miss Remus, and more than that she would miss being loved by Remus, but it would not be fair to him to keep him from other possibilities when she no longer felt for him what he so obviously still felt for her.

"Friends," she echoed, looking around at the books.

She had expected as much. After all, how could they not at least be friends, with their closeness to James and Sirius and Lily? She would be forced to overcome the awkwardness, and that was that.

"That's all right?" he asked a bit nervously.

"Of course it is," Sanna said, smiling and pretending that it was. It would have to be. They shared too many people for her to put it off any longer. "As you said, we always were before. I don't see why we should let something like this come between us."

Except that "something like this" was such a large, important thing. Remus had seen and touched her in ways that no one else ever had, and she him. She could see this same thought pass over him as his eyes flickered to her lips, to her neck, down toward her chest, and then back up again to her eyes. His eyes burned once more and his ears were tinged pink. If she touched his chest, she was sure she could feel his heart racing. It was already a little fast resting, but it grew much faster when he was aroused, so much that she wondered at it being healthy for him.

"I suppose I should go and see Anissa," Sanna said slowly, worried what she might do if he dropped his veneer of moving on and touched her hand. "She wanted to study Charms."

"Of course," Remus said, and the pair stood, both moving to leave the table in the library at the same time, leading to her bumping into him and shocking them both at their closeness, a closeness they had not had in over a month. She looked up at him and took a very quick step back. His breathing had suspended in that moment and his eyes widened, and filled with a sadness that panged her, but she hurried past him.

If she let herself think too long on how she had hurt him, she would not be able to trust her convictions. And she needed to trust that she would do what she needed to do in his case. It wouldn't do any good if she decided she would rather Remus tell himself he was happy then to hurt him. She walked briskly to the Charms courtyard and saw Anissa sitting on a bench, frowning down at her textbook. Only when Sanna was sitting beside her friend did she feel a bit relieved.

"How did it go?" Anissa asked, barely glancing up before turning back down to her book.

"Oh, as well as can be expected, I suppose. He's still in love with me. I almost wish he were mad at me, but I'm not sure that would make things easier in the long run."

Anissa agreed that it likely wouldn't and the girls turned to their studying, practicing their N.E.W.T. level Charms and trying not to get frustrated at the things they couldn't quite figure out. They saw the Prewett twins passing by with Mary and Marlene and waved. Fabian broke from his group and rushed toward them.

"Ladies," he said smoothly, smiling at them. "Anissa, I was wondering…. Well, if you haven't got any plans, do you maybe want to go to Hogsmeade with me in a couple of weeks?"

Sanna held in her gasp.

It wasn't just any Hogsmeade weekend. It was Valentine's Day.

Anissa, who rarely blushed, turned quite pink as she stammered out that she would go with him. He grinned, told her he'd walk her down after breakfast, and then hurried back off with his brother and the two girls, who were giggling happily at what had just happened.

"That really happened," Anissa muttered, her voice begging some sort of confirmation. Sanna assured her that it had, in fact, happened. Anissa continued, "It's just that…I thought I might be dreaming, you know. It was a lot like…."

Anissa had thought the Prewett twins were handsome since their voices changed, but the closer they'd gotten to the boys, the more and more she'd fancied Fabian. Sanna just smirked down at her book, pleased that her whispered hints to Sirius and his prodding of Fabian as Anissa's quiet wingmen had all paid off. They'd started in October, so it had taken long enough, but she looked so happy.

"Oh, fuck. What if" – _Here we go_, Sanna thought miserably – "it doesn't go well?"

"Then at least it's only one date. C'mon, it's not like you've signed away your soul to the boy. It's just Hogsmeade."

"But it's Valentine's Day!"

"One Valentine's Day in a lifetime of them. If it goes badly, well, hopefully you'll have a few good ones in the future to forget it with."

"Life doesn't work like that, Sanna. You remember the bad things more, the regrets, the mistakes, the really bad Valentine's Days and awful first dates."

Sanna shook her head and said, "Well, then just make sure you don't do anything you'll regret, pick the right outfit, and I'm sure everything will be fine! Oh, he asked _you_, you clot. Clearly he's interested. Just calm down and think about what you're going to wear. You've got two weeks. Don't spend all of that time in a tizzy. The night before ought to be good enough."

Anissa looked slightly abashed, but she did spend the next twenty minutes talking about what she ought to wear. Sanna had never understood this fascination with picking out the perfect outfit for a date. Granted, Remus had never cared what Sanna wore, if he looked at it all, so Sanna didn't have much to judge by. But from her talks with Sirius, she suspected that boys hardly noticed what girls were wearing unless it was something spectacularly out of the ordinary, and Fabian had already seen virtually every outfit Anissa could come up with.

Finally, the girls finished talking about clothes, hair, make-up, and the like and Anissa pulled her knees up to her chin.

"Be honest. You told him to ask me out, didn't you?"

Sanna raised an eyebrow.

"I can honestly tell you that I did not tell Fabian to ask you out, nor did I hint, nor did I suggest, nor did I even come close to approaching the topic in any manner with him."

She was quite proud of herself, really, being able to make such a sweeping promise.

Anissa was not fooled, however, and smirked a little as she said, "You got Sirius to do it for you, didn't you?"

Sanna's lips twitched as she tried to keep a straight face, but it was no use. In a few moments the girls were giggling together in the cold February air.

"Well, thanks to both of you, then," Anissa said, running her fingertips along the edges of her Charms book. "Be sure to pass along my gratitude to Sirius."

"I will," Sanna assured her. "But you really can only thank us by having a wonderful time with Fabian. And if you to get married and have children, name them after us, of course."

The girls laughed again, and then decided that they were far too excited to get any more work done. They packed up their things and walked back through the warm castle to Gryffindor Tower. By the way younger girls in the common room began to whisper when they walked in, Sanna figured that the news had gotten around. After Sirius and James, the Prewett twins were two of the most highly desired boys at Hogwarts. They were attractive, charming, and importantly for some, pureblooded. Fabian was particularly preferred because he was less reserved than his twin, and girls seemed to like boys who were sure of themselves.

"Scott!" James barked from by the fireplace. "Prewett tells me you were out in the cold. You'd better not be ill before our next match. You won't be excused from practice!"

Sanna fought the urge to roll her eyes as she marched over to James, Sirius, Remus, and Peter who were lounging by the fireplace. "I'll be fine, James. I know your rules. Would you boys like to get some dinner, or are you planning on wasting away by the fire?"

The girls were given enough time to put their things in their dormitory before the six of them all walked down to the Great Hall together. Sanna fought the urge to tease Anissa about her date in front of Sirius, and they were all remarkably pleasant until they reached the entrance hall.

"Scott."

This voice was not like James's voice. It held complacency, contempt, amusement. Sirius actually moved a bit closer to Sanna as they all turned to find Mulciber smirking at them from down the hall.

"What do you want?" Sirius spat as Mulciber sauntered a bit closer.

"I merely wanted a word with Scott," Mulciber said, raising his eyebrows. "Or is she not allowed away from her bodyguards at night?"

For some reason, Mulciber, Snape, and Rosier had taken to threatening and even attacking Sanna in the halls. Sirius hated it, and James might have hated it most of all. He saw it as an attack on his Seeker, and attacks on his Seeker were not to be tolerated, especially not until the season was over.

"You have nothing to say to me, Mulciber," Sanna said.

At first these attacks had terrified her, but she had grown braver as they had grown more frequent. She suspected that it was a bell curve and that on the other end she would be worn down to the point where she was afraid again, but for the moment she was managing her fears quite well, and was mostly bored with the whole thing.

"On the contrary," he drawled. "I can think of many, many things to say to you, for your ears only, of course."

Sanna dug her nails into Sirius's flesh, mostly to keep herself from pulling out her wand, but Sirius didn't even wince. She wasn't sure if he even noticed. He was too busy glaring at the Slytherin and looking like he wanted to murder him for much else.

"If you don't stop bothering Sanna," Remus said, with remarkable boldness, "I'm going to report you to Dumbledore. It's your choice, Mulciber."

There was a stunned silence on all sides at this, partly because Remus seemed very angry with Mulciber, and partly because he was making a very serious threat. After…whatever Mulciber had done to Mary MacDonald the year before, no one was actually sure why the boy was still at Hogwarts. It had to do something with his family's pull at the Ministry, but everyone knew Dumbledore was itching for a reason or two that would convince the Minister to let him expel Mulciber.

"I'm not afraid of you, Lupin," Mulciber finally said, taking a few steps closer. Sirius moved closer to Sanna, his hand on his wand. "And I think that Scott had better watch her step unless she intends to walk around with a full guard at all times. And somehow I don't think she would like that. Would you, pet?"

Sirius and Remus both actually growled and Mulciber merely smirked and walked into the Great Hall like nothing had happened. Sanna felt her nose twitching in a strange almost-disgust.

"What was that all about?" Gideon Prewett asked. The twins were approaching down the marble staircase, both looking nearly as angry as Sirius, James, and Remus.

"Nothing of consequence," Sanna said airly. "Just Mulciber again."

Gideon's face darkened and Fabian let out an angry, indignant noise.

Gryffindors were nearly as loyal as Hufflepuffs, and they didn't like it when people messed with their own. First Mary, now Sanna…. The war between the two Houses was one thing, but the picking on Gryffindor girls was something entirely separate for her classmates, Sanna knew.

"I've got a plan," Sirius said darkly, "but it does involve…if not round-the-clock surveillance, then nearly."

Before Sanna could argue that she didn't need it, Gideon and Fabian chorused, "I'm in."

"Me too," James snarled.

"I get first shift," Remus spat.

Peter looked around at them with wide eyes, shrugged and said, "Can mine not being during meals?"

The response was flattering, really, but Anissa managed to voice Sanna's major complaint.

"Don't you guys think you're taking this a bit too seriously?"

The six boys all turned and blinked at Anissa like they'd never quite seen her before. Finally, Sirius, who began leading them all off into the Great Hall for dinner, said, "Nothing is more important than the safety of our Housemates, Nelson. Nothing."

After what had happened to Mary, James had said something quite similar to this, and the similarity was obviously not lost on the girls. They all sat down at the Gryffindor table, soon joined by Lily.

"Mulciber looks in far too good of a mood," she muttered in an undertone, mostly to Remus. "You don't happen to know why?"

"He's threatening Sanna," Remus growled. "We've got it covered."

Lily's brilliant green eyes widened in fury and she looked over at the Slytherin table like she was going to start carving its residents up in little tiny pieces. Sometimes, Sanna was more than a little bit afraid of her friend.

"Lily, don't worry," Fabian said, trying to calm her, handing her a glass of water. "We've got Sanna covered. You don't have to keep an extra eye on her."

With a very unlady-like snort, Lily sat down, squeezing herself between Sanna and Gideon, pushing Sanna a bit closer to Sirius.

"You've got to be joking if you think I'm going to do anything but stalk her until either he gets expelled or we graduate," Lily said firmly. "It's too bad I can't stalk too people at once, but if I get Marlene to help…."

Sanna blinked down at her plate. That explained why Marlene never left Mary's side for longer than a few moments anymore. And she was about to be next. She supposed that the positive of this was that nothing else had happened to Mary since the incident in fifth year…yet. And if the Slytherins were focused on two very well-guarded people, they weren't likely to accomplish much of anything. So sanna simply shrugged and asked Sirius to pass her the potatoes.

But she wasn't going completely quietly. She refused to look up the whole of the meal, even when holding conversations. If she was going to become a museum piece for her friends to guard, then she was going to pout about it first.


	3. Routine

N.E.W.T. level work was exhausting, but Sanna did her best to stay on top of things. She wanted a very good job in some sort of research, Ministry funded if at all possible, and if she could get the scores she needed to be an Unspeakable, she would be set for life. The work was hard, but Sanna was convinced that she was up to the challenge.

Except for Potions.

"Why are we taking this class, again?" she groaned at Marlene, who was rubbing her chin thoughtfully over her textbook, trying to understand the complicate procedure for blood-based antidotes.

"Because we need it?" Marlene offered weakly.

Marlene also wanted to be an Unspeakable. Only two were accepted into the program per year, so if both girls were going to make it in and not end up resenting each other, they would have to simply be better than the competition. Being better than the competition meant being excellent at Potions, however, and that was a bit of a tall order for anyone except Lily and Snape.

"Why don't we just have Lily tutor us?" Sanna offered weakly.

With a snort, Marlene just shook her head.

The question hadn't been a serious one. At least one of them asked it every few months, once a term at minimum. Lily had tried to help them for three years leading up to O.W.L.s, and when they remarkably got the scores they needed to go on with their N.E.W.T.s she continued to try to help them for about a month, but it became too much of a task for even the ever-patient Lily Evans to subject herself to.

"I have to say," Marlene finally said, snapping her book shut, "this class keeps me humble if nothing else."

Sanna laughed humorlessly, rubbing her eyes and trying to think of something they hadn't tried.

"Well, we could always beg Severus to explain it to us," she said dryly.

Marlene gave her a dark look.

Of course they weren't about to actually try that. Sirius would have thrown a fit if he'd heard she'd even suggested such a thing, and what with Mulciber's recent threats, she didn't want to antagonize Sirius at all. He was more than a bit on edge.

"I think there's really only one thing we can do," Marlene said softly. "We have to go to Slughorn."

Sanna's pulse began to race just at the mention of such a dreaded thing. Slughorn wasn't her least-favorite adult at the school. That honor was reserved for Filch. But he was certainly her least-favorite professor. The way he played favorites, his lack of ability to actually teach her anything if she didn't already understand, and even the way he smacked his lips while he ate during class – which was every class – offended her.

"Do we have to?"

"Do you have a better plan?"

"I do, actually," Sanna said with false pride. "I was thinking we could falsify our records after we take the exam and nobody has to know we have no idea how to do this!"

Marlene raised an eyebrow.

"And when they figure out that we don't actually know how to do any of it?"

"Then we're screwed. All right, it's not my most brilliant plan ever, but you have to admit that it's better than asking Slughorn."

"No, it actually isn't."

Sanna gave Marlene an annoyed look and checked her watch.

"Give me three days to think of a better one, then," she demanded, snapping her own book shut and scooping it into her bag. "If I don't leave now I'm going to be late for the match against Ravenclaw, and James will literally kill me. It won't matter then."

"Run," Marlene said, her voice dark. "Don't give your sister that satisfaction."

Sanna nodded, bolting through the halls as fast as she could go. She'd asked Anissa to take her broom and uniform down to the pitch for her, and they were waiting for her in the changing rooms along with the rest of the Gryffindor team.

"Hurry up and get changed, Scott," James barked. "You've missed the pep talk."

"Shouldn't you just be glad I've not missed the game?" she teased.

She shouldn't have teased James. At least not right before a Quidditch match, when his nerves were at their worst.

"All right, everybody get your things together," he said sharply, obviously trying to recover his train of thought. "We're heading out soon. Scott, I expect you to catch that Snitch before your jumped up sister has a chance to get her broom level with the hoops."

Sanna just shook her head and laughed. She pulled on her Quidditch robes as quickly as possible, taking her broom out with her as she followed Gideon to the pitch. He was trailing behind the rest, and he smiled at her as they got out to the grass.

"I have a feeling it's going to be a quick match," he said with a confident wink. "I'm going to be aiming at their Seeker the whole time."

"What if you hit me by mistake?" she asked, the teasing tone still in her voice as the neared the center of the pitch.

"Oh, ye of little faith."

They kicked off on the whistle and Sanna began instantly scanning the air for the Snitch. The quicker she caught it, the better off they would all be. James was excellent, but Olivia's snittish comment had him on edge.  
James scored two quick goals, and then Veronika scored another. Sanna flew back and forth across the pitch, looking for the Snitch. Gryffindor and Ravenclaw playing was always a high-speed, high-score match, ever since Olivia had gotten on the Ravenclaw team at twelve. She couldn't keep up with her two older sisters and James Potter put together, but she certainly tried.

Olivia scored a couple, and then Grace and James managed to put up three in quick succession.

One of the Ravenclaw Beaters (Sanna had forgotten his name) hit a Bludger at Sanna, but she dodged it, watching Gideon hit it at the Ravenclaw Seeker, as promised.

"Too close for comfort, Gideon!" she called, before zooming past him, barely noticing him grin before taking off, and smirking into the wind that whipped across her face. Ravenclaw wasn't the sort of match where she ought to have been enjoying herself this much, but somehow she still managed to do so, in spite of the gnawing in her stomach that reminded her how insufferable her sister would be, should Gryffindor actually lose this match.

Fabian hit Olivia with a Bludger another ten minutes in, when the score was all tied up. Sanna winced at the sickening crunch of her sister's arm breaking. Even James looked a bit green at the sound, and Olivia began to cry, but she kept going, refusing her captain's offer for a time out to get her arm looked at. If James Potter wouldn't do it, Olivia wasn't going to either.

But she wasn't as effective with her left arm, especially if she couldn't grip the broom with one hand as she held the Quaffle, and she was obviously in a lot of pain. When Gideon nearly knocked the Ravenclaw Seeker unconscious twice, Sanna finally spotted it: the Snitch, the end of all their misery.

Since the Ravenclaw Seeker was barely conscious, there wasn't much of a race. She'd gotten halfway there by the time the other Seeker even noticed she'd moved, and she had the Snitch in her hand by the time the Seeker had started moving. James shot toward her, hugging her happily, and her teammates joined him. It was made less awkward by the fact that half the team were her sisters.

Gryffindor won 270 to 120. Olivia was taken to the hospital by her teammates directly after the match, and Sanna told James she'd see him at the party later on, catching Fabian put his arm around Anissa out of the corner of her eye.

"I'll save you a butterbeer, then," James said, frowning with a knowing look. She thanked him and went straight to the infirmary.

Her other sisters weren't there, but then, they weren't the ones who had been insulted by Olivia. They didn't feel like she deserved a chance to apologize, anyway. Veronika and Olivia simply didn't get along, and Grace was so much older that she barely noticed Olivia most of the time.

"You look rotten," she said, teasingly, sitting beside her sister, who did look quite pale.

"I hate Skele-gro," Olivia muttered. "Why didn't I just have her Heal it on the spot?"

"Because it would have hurt your pride," Sanna said softly, stroking her sister's hair. "Any one of us would have done the same. Except maybe Veronika."

Olivia gave a wry smile, but she was sweating. Skele-gro was nasty business, as Sanna knew from third year, and she felt a strong pull of pity for her baby sister.

"I'm sorry about being such a horrible bitch before the match," Olivia muttered, her teeth gritted tightly.

"I would have been a bit worried if you weren't," Sanna teased. "You do it every year, after all."

"Yeah, but I expect Potter was a monster," Olivia said, frowning. "And it was my fault."

Sanna reminded her sister that James was always a bit of a monster when it came to Quidditch, and Olivia laughed a bit, before she winced and quieted immediately.

"You should be enjoying your party," Olivia said, picking at the sheet Madam Pomfrey had draped over her.

Sanna shrugged and said, "They're saving me sweets. I figured you'd need to see a friendly face before the night you're about to have."

That was as much of apologizing and making up as was going to happen with the two sisters. They had never been especially close, and the divide seemed to become ever-greater with events like this, but Sanna did her best to try. Their mother always told them that family would only be there for you later if you were good to them now. What with the war on the horizon, Sanna knew perfectly well how much she might need family later, so even if Olivia made things difficult it was worth reaching out now.

"I'll let you get your rest, though," Sanna said, squeezing her sister's good hand gently and standing. "You're going to have a rough night, and I think it's probably best if I don't keep you from sleep."

Olivia nodded and Sanna left for Gryffindor Tower, wand out just in case. To her surprise, Gideon was waiting for her halfway down the first corridor, though, his own wand at the ready, watching for her. He smiled a little when she came level with him.

"How is she?" he asked, keeping his wand out, watching her put hers away.

"In pain," Sanna said, and he nodded. They'd both been in her shoes, although neither had been half as stubborn about it. Gideon walked beside her with brisk alertness, glancing around corners with his wand gripped tightly as if Mulciber were going to jump out from behind a suit of amour and shout "Boo!"

When they got to the party he put his wand away and turned to say something to her, but they were distracted as Sirius called her name loudly from across the room, grinning and motioning her over. Sanna laughed.

"I've been called," she said apologetically to Gideon. He just shrugged and smiled as she hurried over to Sirius. By the time she'd been given her butterbeer and just a hint of firewhiskey, she had completely forgotten that Gideon had been about to say anything to her, much less wondering what he had been about to say.

Sanna celebrated as befitting of the Seeker of a winning Quidditch team, especially a team associated so closely with the Marauders, and then she went to bed. Sunday had to be spent working on a project for Muggle Studies, and Sanna needed all the sleep she could get for the sake of her patience.

The following morning, Sanna dutifully met Peter in the classroom they'd procured access to from Professor McGonagall for the remainder of the term in order to work on their project. Sanna didn't like that she'd been paired up with Peter, who was the clumsiest person she knew, but there had to be something they could do a project on that wouldn't be too difficult for him and would still let their professor know that she knew what she was doing.

"So," Sanna sighed, tapping the heel of her shoe against the stone floor anxiously, "have you thought at all about what you want to work on?"

Peter began to flip through his book with the fairly obvious intent of not looking at her and delaying having to potentially answer her question. Sanna clenched her hands around the edges of her own book and bit the inside of her cheek.

Sanna had no problems with Peter, except that it was exhausting to be around him, to help him constantly, to bolster his self-esteem in a way that didn't insult his intelligence. Because unlike she thought Sirius sometimes thought, Sanna knew Peter wasn't stupid. He actually had quite clever moments. They weren't often that she knew of, but they did exist.

"Right," she finally said, shutting her book, causing Peter to jump a little and look up at her with bashful eyes. "I know Sirius is doing motor vehicles. So we shouldn't do that. Lily wanted to do something about Muggle cooking techniques, since she's an avid baker." Sanna traced her fingernail along a groove in the wooden table. "What do you enjoy, Peter?"

Peter raised his eyebrows.

"Cheese," he finally said.

Well, cheese wasn't baking, Sanna thought. But Muggle and magical methods were the same, just with fewer machines and faster, where cheese was concerned. She rubbed her eyes and tried to think of something Peter might be interested in.

"What about…" she said slowly. "What about magic tricks?"

He raised his eyebrows.

"What d'you mean?"

"Like, Muggle magic tricks," Sanna said, opening her book and flipping through it. "Illusions, slight of hand, things that look like other things. The way they pretend to have magic and do things with cards and knots and stuff. Sawing people in half. You know. Here."

She pushed the book toward him and his eyes scanned the page, getting wider and wider as he went down.

"This is brilliant," he muttered. "This is absolutely brilliant."

Sanna laughed, pleased that they'd found something they could work on together, something Peter would be interested in enough to actually do his part for. They spent nearly an hour reading the text, making notes together for their project, and dividing up further research. Then Sanna put down her quill, stretched, and said, "I think that's quite enough work for one day, don't you?"

Peter was engrossed in the book, apparently not having heard her. Sanna raised her eyebrows and watched him reading, his eyes full of boyish wonder. She took a moment to appreciate this sight: Peter not trying to impress anyone, Peter not caring that someone might be watching, Peter completely free to be himself. There was something strangely beautiful in that, and while Sanna was pleased that he had stumbled into such a close-knit and cool friend group, she also knew that the constant pressures on him to live up to that image of the Marauders was part of what made him so…bumbling. Fear made people clumsy. Peter was naturally a bit clumsy, but fear made him almost hopeless.

"Peter?" she said gently, smiling at him. He started a little and looked up at me. "I think we should probably call it a day, don't you? We can meet again next week, right?"

His mouth formed a little o shape and he nodded.

"Right," he said. "I'll go over these with Remus as well, if that's okay. For ideas."

"That's fine," Sanna said honestly. The awkwardness with Remus had mostly faded by this point, but it was still sweet of Peter to offer to keep her from having to ask Remus. "Just don't show Sirius."

"Why not?"

She grinned.

"I think," she said slowly, "that was should make it sound like we're doing something boring, and then surprise him when we present."

Peter approved of this plan, obviously keen on the idea of impressing Sirius. Sanna was rather keen on the idea as well. Not of her own impressing Sirius. She managed to do that every time she was on the Quidditch field. But she liked the idea of helping Peter impress his friends, and she even was beginning to format the presentation in her mind so that Peter would come off as the star, as the architect of the whole project. The professor would know the truth of it, of course, but it would be great to see the look on Sirius's face. And Peter seemed to be pulling his weight already, so what was wrong with making him look like a star for things he actually knew?

Sanna sat down with the boys in the common room, pulling out her Transfiguration textbook. Sirius scooted a bit closer to her, glancing over her shoulder.

"I taught you that last week," he said with a snort. "What are you reading the book for?"

Her lips twisted into a smile.

"Because when I take the written test, if they ask me for the theory I can't use your eloquent sexual analogies." Sirius snickered. They had been rather clever, but that was shoved from her mind as she saw Remus tense. She glanced up at him and caught his eye, seeing a familiar smoldering in them as he watched her. He looked away after a moment, but she understood. They were healing, they were getting better at being around each other, but for now it was too soon to say sex in front of him, and for now she was still walking on pins.


	4. Disconcerting

She shouldn't have left the library without double checking her bag, but Sanna had been a bit scattered. Exams weren't the next week or anything, but they were right around the corner, and she didn't feel ready for them. Wearily, she slipped into the library, nodded at Madam Pince's stern gaze, and hurried off to her usual table.

Her book was there, alright, but so was something else.

"Hello, Scott," Mulciber said smoothly, flipping through the pages of her Potions book. "Fancy seeing you here."

"I'd like my book back," she said coldly. She wasn't afraid, more annoyed, but she knew Sirius would be mental if he found out.

Mulciber looked at her with amusement in his eyes. Sanna wanted to slap him, but starting a fight with a Slytherin, whether or not she thought she could win, was a bad idea. He slinked closer around the table, book still in hand.

"We could come to an arrangement," he said smoothly.

Sanna felt the urge to vomit the closer he got. He wasn't actually disgusting in the way Snape was. Mulciber obviously had good hygiene and grooming habits, but the silky, oiliness in his voice made her feel dirty, and the way he glanced at her chest made her feel even worse. She couldn't even use Remus as an excuse to make boys go away anymore when she wanted. She could get reasonable boys to leave her alone by veiled hints that Sirius wouldn't approve of them, but Mulciber wouldn't care about that. He wasn't afraid of Sirius like a reasonable person would be.

"I think you should just give me back my book," she said, trying to keep her voice level and cold. She didn't want to give him any sort of encouragement, not even a hint of fear.

"The Dark Lord," he whispered, "will win, Scott. There's really not a question about that. But you have a choice before you. You could come with me willingly, or you could be given to me as a gift, and I can't promise I'll be gentle with you, if it comes to that."

Now she really felt sick to her stomach. She'd always known Mulciber liked the idea of hurting her, although she had assumed it was because she was close with Sirius and James, a friend of "Mudbloods" and blood traitors alike. For some reason it had never occurred to her that he might actually…desire her. She was too stunned and horrified to find the right words to respond, much less the proper tone to say them in.

Unfortunately, as she could have predicted, Mulciber seemed to take this as encouragement, the corners of his mouth twisting into a sinister smirk as he inched forward, touching her cheek. She tried to move away, but there wasn't anywhere to back away to. She was truly cornered.

Suddenly, Sanna did feel afraid, and she wanted to close her eyes and somehow summon Sirius and James and Remus and everyone she could think of, but even if it were possible something like that would take too long. Mulciber was right there, and she had a feeling that if she screamed, if she alerted Madam Pince or anyone else who might have been in the library, Mulciber would be able to do something…probably illegal in order to quiet and subdue her. She'd rather he didn't feel like he had to take such measures. But she also didn't want him to feel like he could take such liberties with her face as he was doing, stroking her cheek.

"Please leave me alone," she said firmly, surprised at the strength of her own voice. She hadn't forgotten what he was capable of.

His laugh was low and full of condescending amusement.

"I don't think you really want that," he muttered. "It's obvious you crave attention, the way you tag along with Black and Potter and that Lupin. I think you'll find my attentions more…satisfying."

She'd heard this line of argument from others before, boys who thought she would appreciate being ogled and aggressively approached because that was how Sirius let girls know he wanted them, and that was how James approached Lily. But just because she was friends with the boys didn't mean she approved of everything they did.

"I honestly doubt," she said, her own lips twisting into a smirk, knowing how badly she was about to hit his ego, "that you could even dream of satisfying me better than Remus."

The dawn of realization on in his eyes at her words, the twist of horror in his mouth that spread to the rest of his face, the disgust that took over his entire expression. It happened so quickly, but Sanna saw it all in delicious slow motion, and if he was about to hurt her, well, at least she got the last laugh on that score.

"Why you little-"

"Mr. Mulciber," Madam Pince's nasally voice said sharply from a few feet away. Mulciber took a step back and Sanna watched his face recede into a calm expression, although his eyes still blazed with fury and lust. "Kindly leave Miss Scott alone or I will give you a very hefty detention."

Sanna felt sudden relief that she'd spent years building up a report with the grumpy librarian. She scurried out into the aisle, not looking back at Mulciber, certain that he was watching her with disappointment and that same mix of fury and lust as she went. She muttered her thanks to Madam Pince and bolted out of the library. Going back to her dormitory seemed a longer trip than usual, although that might have had something to do with checking back over her shoulder every five seconds.

"Sanna, are you all right?" one of the Prewett twins asked her in a concerned voice when she passed through the Common Room, probably looking flustered but she waved them off and rushed up the staircase to her dormitory, pleased to find it empty. She curled up on her bed and centered herself before pulling out her books.

"Dammit," she muttered.

Mulciber still had her Potions book. She rubbed her eyes, briefly thinking through all the ways she could get it back. But for the moment, she couldn't do any of them, so she grabbed Marlene's book out of her bag to use for the night.

Exams were important, and although it was only April, Sanna had learned long ago that the sooner she began to think of the exams as approaching, the better she did when it came time to actually sit down and take them.

She flipped open Marlene's textbook, flipping quickly but carefully through the pages to find the section on antidotes that she'd been struggling with. Even Lily had tried to explain it to her, and she was teetering on the edge of asking Professor Slughor if there was some better way he could explain it to her. If she didn't understand antidotes at the level she needed for N.E.W.T. study, there was no way she would be taken on as an Unspeakable. She might as well give up hope.

Sanna held the book open with a capped ink well and flipped quickly and non-cautiously through her notes to the same section. She had never had to resort to the sort of desperate studying that consisted of staring at material until it sank in subconsciously, but that was all she could think to do until she went to see Slughorn in the morning. She wasn't sure when she'd resolved to see him, but it was sometime when she was glancing at her notes. Otherwise, she was essentially hopeless.

After about fifteen minutes of running her fingers along the pages of information before her, Sanna groaned, setting aside the inkwell so she could snap the book shut with a crisp sound. The snap didn't feel as satisfying as usual, and she fought the urge to throw Marlene's book. Instead, she carefully returned it to Marlene's bag and decided to throw her notes instead. She'd just picked them up and poised herself to throw them to the center of the room when she realized that the pages would scatter and she'd have a hell of a time putting them all back in order again. With a groan, Sanna simply closed her notes and shoved them back in her bag, picking up her Charms book and flipping through that without really reading a word.

The worst part about running into Mulciber hadn't been the confrontation itself, or the fact that she hadn't gotten her book back. The worst part was she knew that he could make her afraid, that she knew more of what he wanted and she was actually afraid of him. Perhaps even worse than that was that she was certain he knew she had been afraid.

And then Sirius would find out about it somehow, and where would likely be a duel and Sanna didn't want to deal with that sort of a mess. Sanna didn't really mind when Sirius got into trouble. After all, he always knew the risks of what he was doing, the things he was taking on by deciding to break the rules. Who was she to tell him what to do?

What she didn't like was Sirius getting into trouble on her behalf. She felt that she could take care of herself pretty well, that he didn't need to be getting extra detentions because he was feeling protective of her. Even Remus had done it a time or two, in spite of her telling him that she didn't like them getting in trouble for her. Perhaps it was a symptom of the famous Gryffindor chivalry, but Sanna could have done without it altogether.

She had gotten to Cheering Charms in her book and contemplated using one on herself. It was difficult to do to oneself, and she recalled from the book that it could even be dangerous, so it shouldn't be attempted by a novice. Or anyone at all, actually.

Well, Sanna wasn't exactly a novice, but she was anyone at all, so she groaned, snapped this book shut with an equally unsatisfying sound and rolled over on her bed, staring at her pillow, trying to decide if there was any useful way to spend her time before bed.

Potions had obviously nothing fruitful she could do, and Charms was bust. She supposed she could ask Sirius to practice Transfiguration with her, but if he realized that she was out of sorts the cat would be among the pixies and she'd have to deal with his irrational sense of protecting her. And Sanna was just too emotionally exhausted to deal with that.

Perhaps she could take a shower or something. That wasn't especially productive as she'd only just taken one that morning, but perhaps she could clear her thoughts.

Sanna rubbed her eyes and ran through possible better solutions, but nothing else seemed right, so she began to gather her things to take a shower. Not a long one, she reasoned. She'd have to have time to have Lily or Anissa dry her hair before she went to bed. But a nice, warm, short shower ought to do the trick. She was just fishing through her trunk for a fresh towel when she heard Anissa say something loudly down the stairs before knocking on the door.

"Decent?" Anissa asked.

"As decent as I'll ever be, I suppose," Sanna sighed, abandoning the idea of a shower and tossing her things back in her trunk as Anissa came into the room, absolutely glowing with excitement. Sanna raised her eyebrows. "What's got you looking like you've been hit with about six Cheering Charms?"

"What? Oh, Fabian and I are officially going out."

Sanna wished she could have felt more pleased for her friend, but her own affairs had her on such an edge that it was admittedly difficult.

"I see," she said vaguely, and turned back to her own bed, pulling the nearest book closer to her.

Anissa sat at the foot of Sanna's bed and gave Sanna a sad smile.

"Gideon said you looked out of sorts when you came up here. Is there something you want to talk about? Something with Remus, or-"

"Nothing with Remus," Sanna snapped.

She was a bit tired with all the thoughts people seemed to have that she was somehow still attached to Remus. She wasn't. There was no attachment at all. If anyone was having difficulty with the breakup, it was him, and he seemed to be getting better all the time. It had been months.

"Fine, then," Anissa said with a frown. "It's not Remus. But something had you worked up."

Sanna just shrugged. She didn't want to tell Anissa about Mulciber, especially now that Anissa was dating Fabian officially. Because Anissa would tell Fabian, who would feel it his duty to tell the rest of the boys, who would then probably all do something stupid thinking they were defending Sanna and her honor or some such utter rubbish. It would be worse than just Sirius finding out. All six of the Gryffindor boys in her year together? Well, she didn't think Peter would play much of a part, but still.

"I left my Potions book in the library and someone nicked it," Sanna said with the most careless shrug she could give.

"Was your name in it?" Anissa asked, frowning. She'd bought into the half-true story, thankfully, and didn't seem to think there was any more to it at all.

"Yes, it was," Sanna said thoughtfully. "Yes, right on the inside of the front cover."

Which was probably how Mulciber had been so smugly certain she'd return for it.

"Well, you should report it to Professor McGonagall," Anissa said reasonably. "I'm sure she and Madam Pince will be able to track it down."

Of course, this was a reasonable course of action, and Madam Pince obviously would know in an instant who had the book. Sanna nodded and said, "Yes, you're right. I'll take care of it first thing in the morning." Then she grinned at her friend and said, "So, tell me about Fabian, miss. Did he ask you in a romantic way? Was it sweet? Was it…. How….?"

"Well," Anissa sighed, throwing herself back onto Sanna's bed with a radiant grin, "it was a bit romantic, I'll confess. Better than I would have expected, given…well."

Sanna nodded. Fabian hadn't always been the most romantic of boys, especially when they were younger and he was…more like Sirius. Sanna would have argued with anyone that Sirius was many good things, but she would never have dreamed of calling him romantic.

"So, what did he do?" Sanna pressed, grinning at her friend. The weight and feeling of dirtiness that she had felt after her encounter with Mulciber seemed to lift with her friend's happiness.

Anissa described how Fabian had set up a date with her in the kitchens, having everything set up in advance with the house-elves. They had her favorite foods, and all of her favorite puddings. Fabian even managed to get the house-elves to give them a bit of mead. It was a sweet, romantic sort of date where they said, Sanna didn't doubt, all manner of mushy and sentimental things to each other. She'd had a few of those with Remus, mostly with him praising her to the skies and her trying awkwardly to think of something to say in return. She'd never been especially poetic.

"And then how did he ask?" Sanna pressed. The lovey-dovey stuff was making her feel a bit lonely.

"Well, he'd pulled me into his lap and was kissing me," Anissa said with a sigh. "He's an excellent kisser, Sanna. It's mind-blowing." Sanna nodded her friend on. "Anyway, after about twenty minutes of snogging, light snogging mind, he pulled back and had this sort of proud look on his face – you know the one – and he said, 'Be my girl' and of course I said I would."

Sanna grinned. It was sweet, seemed like an almost vulnerable way for Fabian to ask her. No doubt he'd thought about it a lot beforehand, but Sanna had a feeling that when it came down to it he asked her rather spontaneously.

"Can you believe I'm dating Fabian Prewett?" Anissa giggled. She turned over and grinned up at Sanna. "I mean, can you honestly believe it? It's not like going to Hogsmeade. It's…it's…"

"You're his girl," Sanna said teasingly, tapping her friend's nose in a patronizing way. They laughed.

Remus hadn't asked like that at all. Remus had been afraid to asked, had paced the floor in front of her about a dozen times after he and Sanna had spent nearly an hour making out in a deserted corner of the library.

_"I love you," he said, looking up at her with desperation. "I shouldn't, but I do. I shouldn't let this keep happening, but I can't seem to stop. I…."_

_ "Remus," she said, standing up and touching his cheek. His eyes closed and he leaned into her touch, letting her other hand stroke his neck. "If you love me, then nothing else matters, does it?"_

_ He gave a groan of disagreement, but Sanna was having none of that._

After another hour of kissing he was begging her to be his. And nothing else mattered.

She wished everything could stay that simple.

Nothing could, though. Many things mattered more than the fact that Remus loved Sanna, like the fact that she no longer loved him and the fact that he needed to respect himself more than to cling to something that wanted to be free.

Sanna told Anissa that she had a slight headache and wanted to go to bed. The lie was received with utter belief, and as Sanna curled up against her pillow, wishing she could find bliss in the emptiness of sleep, she wondered if she would ever get over the hurt and horrified way Remus had looked at her when she told him she didn't love him anymore.


	5. Uneven Footing

Sirius and Sanna had been attempting to study Transfiguration, but they never got very far before Sirius got bored and Sanna could no longer pull his attention back to studying, and they would give up and he would pull out some firewhiskey and they had finally reached the point where half the bottle was gone and they began oversharing about their lives.

"Remus is still devastated, you know," Sirius muttered, his head in Sanna's lap, eyes closed as she stroked his silky raven locks. "He thinks that if he just finds the right way to ask you'll love him again. And then the next hour he thinks he never deserved you in the first place and it was always bound to end like this."

Sanna sighed, taking the bottle from Sirius's hand and tossing her head back, taking a long, heavy pull of the burning liquid. If she and Sirius hadn't been doing this since they were twelve, the amount she'd just had would have knocked her out cold in minutes.

"It's not going to happen."

"I know," Sirius said, gesturing to have the bottle back. He sat up so he didn't choke or spill, just enough to take an even longer pull than she had, then handing it back to her and relaxing in her lap once more.

"Does he still masturbate to me?"

Sirius smirked and opened his eyes.

Sanna and Sirius literally told each other everything, which was uncomfortable for some people – namely James – but suited them just fine. It was the reason Sirius and not Anissa was Sanna's best friend. She could tell him anything as long as she didn't think he'd overreact. She didn't hide important things from him.

"Oh, all the time," Sirius said. "He's not the only one, either."

Sanna wrinkled her nose. It obviously wasn't Sirius or James, and she hoped it wasn't Fabian considering the fact that he was dating one of her closest friends. The only thing she could guess was that it was Peter, and nothing made her feel sicker inside than the thought of Peter Pettigrew masturbating to her. Sirius had told her in third year that Peter had done so once, and Sanna had warned him never to mention it again. Up until now he'd never done so, but then, he was very, very drunk. Perhaps he had forgotten the promise.

"How are things with the sisters?" he asked, tracing lazy shapes on her stomach through the thin white material of her shirt. He did this sometimes, when her hair was too far away to play with.

"More or less the same. Grace and Veronika are fine. Just Olivia. And you know how Olivia is."

Sirius nodded, continuing to trace the indistinguishable shapes against her skin. When they were younger, Olivia had been absolutely terrible to Sirius, before she realized that this was a bad idea because he could easily ruin her life.

"I wish Regulus and I could talk to each other still," Sirius muttered, turning his face so that he was pressing his forehead against her lower abdomen. With anyone else Sanna would have pushed them away, but drunk Sirius got a lot of leeway. "But he's gone all super-dark with the family, you know."

"He's not that bad."

Sanna felt the smoothness of Sirius's hair. It always stunned her when they were drinking how incredibly soft his hair was. She was a little bit jealous, actually. It was like petting a bunny with very long hair. Or a guinea pig.

Sirius just grunted.

"Sanna, I think I'm dying," he groaned after a long moment. "I drank too much."

Sanna sighed. The fun was over. She summoned all her mental faculties and shot Sirius with a Sobering Charm. He groaned, sitting up, the hangover hitting him brutally all at once. He downed a bit of hangover tonic, which he kept in his bedside table, and then returned the favor. Sanna held out her hand for the tonic as soon as her head began to split. She downed it in one and handed the empty vial back to Sirius.

"I'm going to have to get more of that," Sirius sighed. "Before our next study session."

Sanna grinned at him.

"Nice to feel like that for a bit, though," she sighed. Her fingers reached for his hair again, but Sirius shook his head, sitting up and gesturing to his own lap. It was her turn now that they were sober.

Sanna rested her head on his lap, looking up at the ceiling before closing her eyes and feeling his gentle fingers running through her long, blonde hair. She sighed.

"What are you going to do if he ever does get the balls to ask you out again?"

"He won't."

And Sanna really believed that. Remus was too afraid of being rejected to try again.

"But what would you say if he did?"

"I don't know," Sanna muttered. "I'd be polite. But I'm not going there again, Sirius. I just can't. It wouldn't be fair."

"You miss him?"

"Of course I miss him, but it just wouldn't work."

Sirius continued to stroke her hair and Sanna could almost sense him thinking hard about something before he said, "What if someone else asked you out? Is it too soon, or do girls care about stuff like that?"

Sanna snorted.

"Sirius, it's been months. Whether or not I date a guy would be completely dependent on who was asking." She opened her eyes and looked up at his thoughtful face. "Why?"

Her stomach dropped as she thought of Mulciber, as she thought of Peter. There were too many boys she wanted nothing to do with in that way. And she could hardly think of anyone she'd want to date at that point. She wouldn't say no to a single date with most boys, but any more…. Sirius shrugged.

"No reason," he lied breezily.

Sanna didn't mind that he was lying. It only meant he'd promised someone not to say a word. She could respect such promises.

The idea that it might be Peter, however, did make Sanna's working on her final project with Peter in Muggle Studies more than a little bit awkward.

They were sitting together in their classroom during the designated time when they had it reserved, carefully creating their presentation poster. Finally, Sanna couldn't stand it anymore.

"Peter, do you have a crush?"

He actually jumped and she thought it was confirmation until he finally muttered, "Yeah, there's a girl in fifth year I sort of like."

Sanna was shocked to hear this, but she nearly let out a sigh of relief.

But then, if it wasn't Peter, who was it?

"Is she pretty?"

"Yeah."

"Smart?"

Peter shrugged, but Sanna took this as a yes. She told him as best she could how he had the best chance of impressing a girl, considering that he was Peter and not Sirius, and taking Sirius's advice would do little but embarrass him in front of the girl he liked.

"I've got a question," she said, trying to keep her hands from shaking as she pasted a picture onto their poster. "You know basically everything that goes on in our year." Peter blushed even more at this, but it was largely true. Peter knew an awful lot about everybody's business, which could be uncomfortable at times but bloody useful at others.

"Yeah?"

"So, this is more of a favor than a question," Sanna said slowly. "Other than Remus, do you know of anyone who has a thing for me?"

To her surprise, Peter actually laughed. Then he said, "There's quite a few people," he said. "Pick a House."

This was surprising news to Sanna, but she said, "Gryffindor," knowing that the person Sirius referred to was definitely a Gryffindor."

Peter blushed again and looked down at the picture he was putting paste on.

"You mean in our year."

"Yes."

He looked up at her, with surprising calm and composure and said, "I'm sorry, Sanna. I can't tell you that."

Damn, she thought. If Sirius wasn't allowed to say and Peter wasn't allowed to say then everyone she knew must have been sworn into secrecy. It was maddening. She almost found herself attracted to this person, whoever they were, for the sheer mystery of it all.

"Is it somebody I like?" Sanna asked.

"You like all of us," Peter said, his eyes widening as if he'd never considered that anything else might be possible.

Sanna laughed and nodded before saying, "Yes, that's true. I do like all of you. Well, I suppose you can't tell me and I can't think of better questions to ask to narrow the field so I'll just have to wonder."

Except Sanna didn't want to wonder if no one would tell her. Because she already had decided she couldn't figure it out on the information she had, and she'd rather not find out that James or Fabian or Merlin forbid Sirius secretly had a thing for her. Secrets were sometimes better as secrets.

"So," Sanna finally said, stepping back from their poster and smiling at it, "I think this is actually rather impressive."

"We didn't use any magic," Peter said, frowning a little. "The really cool ones are going to use magic."

"We did it the Muggle way, though," Sanna reasoned, "so we'll get extra credit. What would you rather, have someone think it's cool or get a better grade than the people who were showing off?" Peter grinned a little. "Besides, our demonstration is inherently awesome. I mean, who else would saw a pretty girl in half?"

Sirius was going to flip out when they announced that Peter was going to saw her in half, and that was the point. Sanna couldn't wait to see the look of fear on Sirius's face, and then to see his shock and relief when she was not, in fact, dead.

"We're going to have to practice this a lot," Sanna said for the umpteenth time that day. "I don't want something going wrong in class. I mean, you can't actually saw me in half, but the whole point of this is that it's impressive that it works. We can't fuck it up."

Peter nodded and said that he would practice as often as she liked, as often as they needed. The Marauders wouldn't think it strange that they spent so much time practicing their presentation. After all, Peter was supposedly the dull one, the slow one who needed all sorts of extra help and pushing to accomplish anything. Nothing at all would seem strange about Sanna having to put him through extra paces where the others would no doubt feel that they hardly needed any practice in such a simple subject.

"They'll be shocked," Sanna said proudly as they packed up their things and stored their poster.

"Yeah," Peter said, smiling. "Listen, you…don't mind if I catch up with you in a bit, right? I've got…"

"No problem," Sanna said quickly, seeing that Peter was turning red. Likely he had to use the toilet and she didn't want him to be too embarrassed talking about it. For her, it seemed like no big deal, but everything seemed to be a big deal to Peter. "I'll walk slowly. I doubt Sirius will ever have to know."

She hoisted her bag over her shoulder and walked out of the classroom, keeping to her word and walking slowly along the corridors, trying to enjoy the solitude instead of anxiously listening for Peter. Of course, anxiously listening was what she did most of, and the footsteps only seemed like Peter for a moment.

Peter's gait wasn't that long or sure of itself. Her hand went to her wand and she turned to face the footsteps.

Of course it was Mulciber. Sanna couldn't imagine it being anyone else at this point. She frowned at him.

"Want your book back, pet?" he said, smirking.

"Yes," she said firmly. "And I'll get it back. I don't need you to hand it to me now. I'll get it back now or later."

He seemed amused as he took a few steps toward her. She drew her wand and he actually laughed.

"I'm not going to hurt you, Scott. Not now." The sinister lilt of those two words made her feel a bit of fear once more, and she hated herself for feeling it. "Now, there's a simple way of getting your book back, and of my not having to hurt you."

"I'm not going to be with you, Mulciber," Sanna spat. "Not now, not ever."

He laughed again.

It was absolutely chilling how amusing he found her defiance. It suggested to Sanna that perhaps he knew something she didn't, and Sanna didn't like not knowing things.

"That isn't even the question," he said, taking another step forward. Sanna didn't know what to do. His wand wasn't even out. Was it fair or right to hex him if he didn't do anything first? She didn't want to be so trigger-happy she couldn't defend herself if he tried to get her into trouble. "No, this is a much…much more basic sort of act. You simply have to…ah, reconsider your loyalties."

This time, Sanna laughed, and the laugh left her lips before her brain had even finished processing what he was telling her.

"What would Voldemort want with me?" she said, smirking at him. Her fear had dissipated. She suddenly felt much stronger than him, a feeling that only intensified when bewilderment flitted across his features. "I'm not a pureblood."

He tried to gather himself, to present himself as fearless once more, but Sanna had seen his discomfort, his disconcerted moment, and she was going to keep that in her memory to keep herself from believing his bravado.

"He recognizes quality where it exists," Mulciber said stiffly. "You are not a Mudblood. That's what matters."

Of course, that wasn't what mattered and Sanna knew it. She'd read about Voldemort's sort, where the first step was killing Muggles and Muggleborns, the second step killing off half-bloods, and not just the ones who caused trouble. Purity was the only thing that matter, except perhaps for power. She was a child. She had no real power, just as Mulciber had no real power within his context. And knowing what she did about megalomaniacs, no one would be allowed real power except for Voldemort if he got his way.

"Quality," she said disdainfully. She marveled at how simple it was to recall that feeling inside herself, to pull it out with such ease. "And what would Voldemort know of my quality, as you put it?"

Mulciber's eyes flashed with the mention of his master's name.

"The Dark Lord takes a keen interest in the better students. The blood traitors you consort with are mostly a lost cause, but not everyone has sold themselves to Dumbledore's lost cause yet."

"So your Dark Lord thinks I would be interested in joining him," Sanna said, amused, her lips twisting, although remaining in a smirk. "He's stupider than I thought he was. But then, I knew you were that stupid. If you weren't, you wouldn't keep trying to talk to me. I'm not interested in you or your precious Lord. I'll have to decline."

She turned to walk away, knowing that Peter would just go back to the Common Room looking for her, but Mulciber grabbed her wand arm with a firm grip. Sanna froze, feeling his breath on her neck as he stepped right up behind her, his fingers on her wrist almost crushing her. That would bruise if she did nothing with it by morning.

"Don't be hasty, pet," he whispered, just inches away from her ear. Sanna swallowed down the urge to vomit. "You might not like the results."

"If you don't let go of me right now," she hissed, "the Marauders will be here sooner than you would think, and you're not going to like those results."

He gave a low, sinister chuckle against her skin. A finger on his free hand traced the back of her neck with complacent slowness. It wasn't gentle, but there was lightness to it, like he was certain he'd do it again soon.

"What, afraid, Scott? You need your pathetic Marauders to protect you? What happened to the strong, confident Gryffindor? Go ahead, threaten me. Try to make me feel small. It's amusing and a bit arousing."

Sanna hissed, trying to wrench her arm free from his grasp. Oh, yes, that was definitely going to bruise.

"Now, now, now," he said softly. "Calm down, pet. You have a bit of time to consider the proposals. I suggest you do consider them, though, and quickly. The Dark Lord will not wait forever, and his mercy is a fickle thing. Tread carefully."

Almost before she understood that he was gone, he had slithered away and left her standing alone in the corridor. When she was left with nothing but her own body to interact with, she suddenly realized how violently her heart was pounding, how long she had been holding her breath. Could he smell her fear the way Sirius and Remus sometimes could? Was he taking some sort of sick pleasure out of it?

Sanna wanted to talk the longest shower of her life, and she wanted to take it right that minute.

"Sorry I took so long!"

The squeak of Peter's voice had never been more welcome.

"Don't worry about it," she said, clearing her throat to try to cover the shakiness of her voice. She would have to ask Remus to borrow his bruise paste, say it was an accident in the shower or something…. She would have to ask right away, before the marks began to show.

"You didn't get as far as I would have thought."

"Oh, well, I did say I would walk slowly," Sanna lied. Her voice was back to being smooth and casual.

And Peter, thank Merlin, was none the wiser.


	6. Closings

Sanna could feel her hands beginning to shake as she picked up her quill, but she managed to steady herself before Professor McGonagall told the N.E.W.T. students to begin their sixth year exams. When she turned over her exam and read the first question she gathered enough calm to manage to smooth her handwriting, masking her fear.

She could almost sense Sirius's confidence and disdain for the exam radiating from the desk beside her. If she only had half his knowledge for Transfiguration Sanna would have been satisfied to look at the exam in a similar manner. But she was not half as brilliant as Sirius.

Transfiguration was their last exam of the year. They would have results in a few days' time, do the end-of-year feast, and then take another ride from Hogwarts back to King's Cross station. Just one more exam, just a short period of time, and she would be able to begin studying in earnest for her final year, for her N.E.W.T.s.

A year or two ago she wouldn't have been able to imagine what on earth would lead to her to studying over the summer like this. But her sister, Grace, had done that last summer and she'd seemed remarkably poised for a girl about to take her N.E.W.T.s. Sanna had decided to copy her sister upon this realization, and although her younger sisters would tease her and her friends, by and large, might also have a bit of fun at her expense on the matter, Sanna knew she already had enough on her plate without agonizing over her exams. The more she got done early the more she could relax later and focus on other things that might need her attention: like Mulciber's threats and what she was going to do after school. There was plenty to be concerned with.

When Professor McGonagall ordered, sometime later, for their quills to go down, Sanna stopped her third re-read of the exam and reluctantly put her quill down while Professor McGonagall Summoned the exams. Sirius glanced over at her and grinned. His expression faltered, however, when he saw the grim expression on her own face.

They walked out of the classroom and he put his hand on her shoulder to slow her.

"You did fine, Sanna."

"You don't know that. I don't know the material like you do."

"For Merlin's sake," he groaned. "This isn't Potions. You're good at Transfiguration. So it's not your best subject. So what? You can't be the best at everything."

Sanna would have liked to have pointed out that she really wasn't the best at anything, but she didn't want the lecture from Sirius to continue, so she simply shrugged and kept walking.

"Sanna."

She didn't stop, though, continuing on her way, wondering if she would be able to sleep in the few days before their exam results came back. Sirius caught back up with her quickly.

"Sanna, please tell me you aren't going to make yourself sick over this, right?"

With a weak sort of laugh, Sanna tried to make it all seem like a joke, but she knew he was actually concerned about her and she didn't like concerning him. When they reached the common room she turned to him and said in a voice that indicated she was making him a challenge, "If you keep me distracted, then I won't have time to worry about it."

Sirius grinned, the only sign necessary to indicate that he was accepting the challenge. The Marauders announced not ten minutes later to the girls that they were all going to the lake, to put on their bathing suits, and to meet them down by the oak tree in twenty minutes.

The girls did as bid, hurrying down to the lakeside where Fabian and Gideon were already splashing each other in the shallows and Sirius was arguing with James on whether or not they should try to play with the giant squid.

"Look out, boys!" Sanna squealed as she ran toward the water, feeling carefree and warm and light as she jumped right in with Gideon and Fabian, who were roaring with excitement. Anissa ran in without jumping, shrieking in delight as Fabian scooped her up in his arms and placed a sloppy wet kiss on her cheek.

It felt like freedom, like that last little taste of joyful freedom before they had to go back to the real world.

They played in the lake for three days straight, only breaking for meals, sleep, and showers. Sanna found she took a strange sort of pleasure watching Fabian and Anissa make out leisurely underneath the oak tree, and Sirius seemed so happy that Sanna was happy and safe that her anxiety about her scores all but vanished.

And then the results were distributed at breakfast on the fourth day.

The nausea, the fear, the self-doubt all rushed back at once, until Gideon Prewett expressed that he was a bit nervous about sitting across from her when she looked like that, no doubt green in the face, her hands shaking as they clutched the results of her exams.

"Open them," Sirius said encouragingly.

If she didn't pass everything she needed to pass she would have to retake, or give up on being an Unspeakable. Either option was absolutely unthinkable to Sanna, and so the fear of opening the envelope was crushing her inside.

"Oh, for Merlin's sake," Remus snapped, snatching the envelope from her hands. Sanna squeaked with shock and horror as he swiftly opened the results and his amber eyes scanned the results. He looked up at her and rolled his eyes, tossing it back to her. "You're fine, Sanna. You've passed everything. Now eat something and stop looking like you're going to sick up all over the table. Some of us find it off-putting."

The fact that Remus had never spoken so sharply to her was lost on her once he announced that she'd passed everything. Instead she gingerly lifted the results and scanned them with her own eyes.

She had done it. She had passed everything. Potions would need a significant boost if she was going to even be considered for the program, but she was one step closer.

That afternoon, Sanna finished her packing in near-solitude. Those who had more of a head on their shoulders during exams had already finished packing, so Marlene and Sanna were the only girls left stuffing things haphazardly into their trunks.

At least, this was what Sanna was busy doing until she noticed that Marlene was sitting in front of her own trunk, staring into it dejectedly.

"Marlene? Are you all right?"

Marlene shrugged.

Her results were sitting next to her knee, and Sanna sat down beside her, gesturing as a way of asking if she could look at them. Marlene waved in a dismissive sort of approval.

Good scores, all. She'd done remarkably well, perhaps even a bit better than Sanna in a few things. But her Potions score, while passing, was only barely passing.

Sanna's first internal response was that she was pleased to have beaten someone, even if it was her friend and study partner. Her second thought was that Marlene was going to have to do some serious work if she was going to make the program, more so than Sanna.

"I see," Sanna said softly, setting the results back down on the ground. "It's not hopeless, Marlene."

"I know," Marlene choked out. "But I don't know what else I can do. I feel like I'm at my limits with Potions, and I don't know how to push forward. And if I don't…"

"You will," Sanna said firmly. "We can meet up over the holidays and study, maybe get Lily to help us. I'm sure she'd do her best."

"We've tried that."

"Well," Sanna said slowly, thoughtfully, tracing her leg thoughtfully with her fingernail. "Well, I've made an arrangement with Professor Slughorn. I'm sure he wouldn't mind you joining in. You're not pureblooded, but you're more so than I am. If he's happy to help me he'll be thrilled to help you."

Sanna didn't want to mention that Slughorn wasn't exactly what she thought of as happy to help her, but he did work hard to pretend he was. She would give him credit where credit was due.

Marlene nodded, tossing shoes into her trunk.

"How long until the feast?" she asked hollowly.

Sanna checked her watch and gave the answer, turning back to shoving the last of her own things into the trunk at the foot of her own bed.

"Are you going to sit with us, or are you going to sit with one of your sisters?" Marlene asked.

"I'll be sitting with Grace," Sanna said slowly.

Veronika and Olivia didn't understand yet how strange it would be when Grace left Hogwarts, graduated and off in the real world. She wouldn't be a regular fixture in their daily lives anymore. She would be a signature in letters, fine handwriting on a scrap of parchment.

Grace and Sanna weren't the closest of the four sisters, but it was already hitting Sanna just how strange it would be, Quidditch without Grace, meals without seeing Grace, any holiday she spent at the castle without Grace being there too. The least she could do was sit with her sister for the last day of their being together at Hogwarts, and on the Hogwarts Express.

"Has she got a job yet?"

"Ah, she's got a few offers, pending her N.E.W.T.s," Sanna said, sighing. "Once she gets her scores she'll be able to make her choice, but she'll have to make it quickly."

"Well, she's got time to think about it."

Sanna nodded, closing and latching her trunk before turning back to Marlene, watching her friend slowly squishing things into the trunk. Sanna sighed.

"Do you want some help?"

It took the girls another half hour to be certain that neither they nor any of their roommates had left anything behind.

"I think that's all," Sanna said, looking around with a frown. "Do you know, we're going to be on the top of the tower next year. Won't that be strange?"

"It'll be a bloody lot of stairs, that's what it'll be," Marlene grumbled, with only the slightest grin.

"Hadn't thought of that."

Sanna thought, somehow, that it was worth it. Nobody walking loudly and inconsiderately passed their door early in the morning after essays were due. No people passing their door at all, actually. The very tip-top of Gryffindor Tower! And while the view was excellent from their floor, she could only imagine how excellent it was just one floor higher. She wondered what would happen if she…if she just….

"Sanna?"

Turning to a bemused Marlene, Sanna realized that she'd stood at the window, leaning out into the summer air, and that she'd been trying to lean further out.

What a strange thing for her to do. She could not, pulling her body full into the room again, think of why she had been doing it. She turned to face Marlene, who was frowning at her slightly.

"We should head down to the feast," Marlene said slowly. "If you want to get a seat by Grace. It's bound to get crowded soon."

Marlene didn't seem to want to talk about whatever it was Sanna had just done, and Sanna didn't feel too comfortable with the idea of talking about it either. The comfortable silence all the way down the Great Hall was the sort only able to be sustained between the best sort of friends. Marlene and Sanna would never be best friends, if only because they both understood that they would be possibly competing for a slot in the same very competitive program. They tried not to let such things come between them, but it was a hard thing to work toward.

They reached the Great Hall and Sanna spotted her sister, touching Sirius's shoulder happily before walking off to sit by Grace.

"Hey," Grace said, smiling up at Sanna with slight surprise and a heavy dose of amusement. "Not sitting with your boys?"

"No," Sanna laughed. "No, I wanted to spend the feast and the train ride with you, if that's all right."

"Of course it is!"

The sisters share a knowing smile between them, pleased to understand just how much it meant to both of them, what they were doing there, together at Hogwarts for the last time.

The food was excellent, but it was always excellent at Hogwarts. The Hall was decorated with Gryffindor colors to celebrate their winning the House Cup, but this was something Sanna and Grace had grown used to, especially since James Potter had joined the Gryffindor Quidditch team and they began making up for all the points he lost in the castle on the Quidditch field. Sanna wouldn't have known what to think if the Hall hadn't been decorated in scarlet and gold.

"Do you want my notes for N.E.W.T.s?" Grace asked as she piled some potatoes onto her plate. "You know, for next year."

Sanna gave her sister a wry smile and said, "Ask me again when you've gotten your results. Then I'll have an answer."

The girls laughed, but it was a tense sort of laughter, because underneath the joking was the truth of the matter: Grace could prepare all she wanted for the N.E.W.T.s, but none of it really mattered if she hit a bad day on a test, or simply misinterpreted something. Everything rode on two short weeks of testing, not her seven years of excellence.

And the same thing would be true of Sanna the next year.

"D'you think there's any chance you'll be getting back with Remus?" Grace asked when they got to desert. Sanna shook her head. "It's a shame, you know. He's a nice boy. Mum loved him."

Every mother would have loved Remus. He was intelligent, polite, mild-mannered, and even volunteered to help with the dishes. He was respectful to Sanna, reasonably good-looking without seeming to know he was at all attractive….

But Sanna wasn't dating to please her mother. She was dating to please herself, and as sweet and wonderful as Remus was, Sanna knew now that he would never be right for her. She needed someone who would be exciting and interesting and dare her to do things. There were plenty of boys who would do that and turn around and be polite at the end of the day to please her mother as well. She just had to find one.

At the end of the feast, Sanna told Grace she'd sit with her on the train ride home as well, and the girls went off for the last night of the year sleeping in the castle. In the morning Sanna changed quickly, brushed her hair and teeth, and threw the last of her things in her trunk before heading down to meet Grace at the carriages to Hogsmeade.

"Sanna!" Sirius said happily when he saw her.

"I'm sitting with my sister," she told him apologetically, shrugging.

Sirius gave her an understanding look and she and Grace found a compartment toward the back, sitting down at the two window seats and stretching their legs on the other, empty seats toward the door.

"What about Sirius?" Grace teased as the train began to move, smiling out at the sun-stroked platform of Hogsmeade.

"What about him?"

Grace turned to Sanna with a grin.

"I suppose Mum wouldn't think much of you dating Sirius, would she?"

Sanna just laughed.

Of course, their mother liked Sirius well enough. He was always on his best behavior when he visited the Scotts, and he was probably liked most of all because the very idea of him and Sanna ever dating was ludicrous. If such a thing ever were to occur, he was the sort of boy no parent wanted their daughter dating, even if he was somehow different than he seemed.

"I'm just not going to date for a while," Sanna said with a smile, resting her head against the wall of the compartment, her eyes gazing at the wild, untamed Scottish countryside whizzing past out the window. "It's not as if I need to."

"No," Grace agreed slowly, handing Sanna a half a chocolate bar she had just broken. "No, I guess you'll have N.E.W.T.s and a job and everything to think about. And Quidditch. You're probably right. You don't need to date. It's easier, not dating."

Grace had dated a boy during her fifth and sixth years who had been a year older than her. But just before she'd come back for her seventh year, she'd learned that his whole family had been killed by Death Eaters. Two Muggle-born parents.

Remembering that as she looked out at the sunny countryside chilled Sanna's blood.

If her mother knew that Remus was a werewolf, he wouldn't have been half as welcome in the family, not because the Scotts were prejudiced. But with the war, people were sticking to their own kinds more than ever. A lot of werewolves were joining Voldemort, and Remus was already convinced that he would never get a fair shake. Convincing her mother that Remus would never dream of joining Voldemort would have been difficult. Thinking rationally when people are dying all around you is just difficult.

"I'm going to miss you next year," Sanna said softly after swallowing the last bit of her chocolate. The background out the window was morphing into city and they would be pulling in at the station soon. The train was just beginning to slow down.

"You'll be fine," Grace said, grinning, kissing the top of Sanna's forehead as she stood up, pulling on her jacket. "You'll have loads of fun without me. You'll hardly notice I'm gone at all after a while. And before you know it, you'll be graduated too."

That hardly seemed possible to Sanna. She could barely fathom, at that moment of her life, that she would ever have a life without Hogwarts.


End file.
